


coda to A Strange, Melancholy Dream by Saucery

by triesquid



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: BAMF!Stiles, Character Death, Coda, M/M, Magic, Magic!Stiles, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Pre-Slash, Protection Magic, Saucery, Self-Sacrifice, angry!Deaton, if that's not a scary thing i don't know what is, oblivious is oblivious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-03
Updated: 2013-02-03
Packaged: 2017-11-28 01:22:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/668645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/triesquid/pseuds/triesquid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek finally has a moment to visit Stiles' grave and actually think about what Stiles had done for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	coda to A Strange, Melancholy Dream by Saucery

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Saucery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saucery/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Echo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/511810) by [Saucery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saucery/pseuds/Saucery). 



> A coda to [Saucery's](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Saucery/pseuds/Saucery) [A Strange Melancholy Dream](http://saucefactory.tumblr.com/post/32663666641/a-strange-melancholy-dream).
> 
> I--I just couldn't let it end that way. Sorry-not-sorry.

Derek was standing in front of Stiles’ grave-marker, finally having a moment to come now that the Big Bad of the Moment had been sorted, not knowing really knowing why he was here.

Stiles had died—Isaac had told him, he thought, but it could have been Erica—but the reality of a quiet little marker in a quiet little cemetery seemed  _wrong_  somehow, seemed like too little, too much absence, and too much  _lack_.

Just  _too much_.

Stiles had so rarely been silent or still:  a silent death didn’t suit him.

Stiles should have gone up in a blaze of glory ( _Because it’s a good day to die, dude_ , echoed Stiles’ voice from one of the innumerable fiascoes of their-world-ending proportions they had faced, that Stiles had serendipitously stumbled upon again—just like he always just appeared when the Pack needed saving) rather than this silent, abrupt death.

Derek heard Deaton long before he saw him, climbing up the hill to where Stiles’ marker dwelled.  Deaton’s face, usually so reserved and stuck in mocking serenity, was open for possibly the first time that Derek had ever seen—full of gut-wrenching, heart-destroying,  _loving_  grief.  So much so, that Derek felt a pang that he felt so very little.

That wasn’t right for a comrade-in-arms.

If he were honest—and Derek always tried to be honest with himself if with no one else—he was surprised by how deeply affected his Pack had been by Stiles death.  Scott devastated, he had expected abstractly—Stiles had been his best friend for so many years, had assisted Scott initially with “the werewolf shenanigans”—but  _Jackson_?   _Peter_?

The entire Pack was acting as if they had lost One of Their Own, one of their Packmates, someone indispensable and loved.

Someone irreplaceable.

It wasn’t like Stiles had been Pack or even been that close to any of them—except for Scott.  Sure, Stiles had lent a magical hand on occasion (usually after he had stumbled upon them plotting somewhere that wasn’t hidden away, when those secluded, safe places hadn’t been available), had woven them talismans and charms (in a glut, at first, and then, in drips and drabs as they were necessary), had played accidental cavalry on a number of occasions.

Still somehow saved Derek’s life with alarming regularity.

Stiles hadn’t been  _with_  them, hadn’t been  _part of them_ —not since the day Stiles had told Derek that he loved him “ya know, with more than wolfy-obsession-and-submission.”

Derek had rejected him as gently as he could (re:  probably not gentle at  _all_  because Derek still pretty much sucked at all of this), and Stiles had been—fine.  Just fine.  A wide (Maybe sad?  Maybe resigned?  Maybe just confirmed?), open smile had stretched Stiles mouth, a head nod, and a “Hey, never know ‘til you sniff.”, and Stiles began to slowly remove himself from their lives—from Derek’s life—developing a professional distance.

Always on the periphery.

Never close enough for Derek to really talk to again.

If Derek missed their easy banter, he wasn’t about to tell anyone.

Derek remained where he stood, rooted to the spot, watching Deaton climb the hill—Deaton, who was Stiles’ second father, who had buried Stiles on this hill, who had chosen Stiles’ grave-marker—watching as Deaton saw Derek, watching as Deaton’s face became smooth and emotionless, watching as Deaton’s face became filled with rage.

It took everything that Derek had to remain where he was, to not give away any ground to someone who was more-than-human but less-than-wolf.

“Deaton,” Derek nodded in greeting, wondering—desperately trying to justify—if he should just leave:  leave Deaton to his grief, leave this place where Stiles  _wasn’t_. 

Just like Derek’s family  _wasn’t_.

And, Deaton was just—there.  He was standing directly in front of Derek, pushing into his personal space, toe-to-toe—and if Deaton had been a wolf, he would have been challenging the Alpha.

A long, unblinking moment stretched painfully between them before Deaton spoke—growled, grinded—voice just this side of a shout, breaking that calm that was  _so rarely broken_  that it was like a sacrilege, a world-ending event.  ”You’re still, at best, a D+-Alpha.  If you were the sort of Alpha that you  _thought_  you were, that  _your mother_  had been— _that Laura had been_ —you would have realized that one of your own Pack was letting himself die in order to save your ungrateful, selfish ass.  That Stiles was sacrificing himself for you, dying by breathes and inches.  You would have realized that, whether you liked it or not, he was part of your Pack, but he was left on his own  _without the protection of the Pack_ , without the protection of his  _Alpha_.  Stiles wasn’t your personal shield or personal Merlin or  _whatever_ —”  Deaton cut himself off, took a deep breathe, and that eerie calm fell again.  ”Stiles was wasted on you, and you don’t even mourn for him.”

Deaton turned and walked back down the way he came, leaving Derek to wonder if he had been the only one to not have included Stiles as Pack, to not have seen him _as Pack_ , to not have  _seen_  Stiles.

_Idiot, sourwolf._   Again, Stiles voice came unbidden, echoing with memory.

And, there was that pang again.


End file.
